


it's bright where you are

by SugarFey



Category: Gideon the Ninth - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: F/F, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-05
Updated: 2019-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:13:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21681238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SugarFey/pseuds/SugarFey
Summary: A breath of air ghosts over her cheek, ruffling her hair. And then…'All that effort for me? I’m flattered.'“Griddle!” Harrow’s eyes fly open.Becoming Lyctor was supposed to be dream come true. Instead, all Harrow can think of is Gideon Nav.
Relationships: Gideon Nav/Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Comments: 9
Kudos: 142
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	it's bright where you are

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jessikast](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jessikast/gifts).

> This is for jessikast, who requested fix-it and banter between Gideon and Harrow. I hope this is something like what you wanted! All the best for Yuletide. :D

Harrow slumps against the door of her room, pressing the heels of her hands against her eyes. The cold air of the Emperor’s palace leeches through her clothes, soaks into her skin and pools in her bones with the weight of all the loss that has come before. She has been telling herself for hours now that Gideon is gone, that Harrow must come to terms with it, but the voice inside her which is louder, which drowns out any thought of acceptance, fills her lungs to until she gasps for air. Her hands press harder until stars burst behind her eyelids. _Come back, come back, you have to come back._

A breath of air ghosts over her cheek, ruffling her hair. And then…

_All that effort for me? I’m flattered._

“Griddle!” Harrow’s eyes fly open.

_Yeah._

Harrow tries to say something, but all that comes out of her mouth is a highly undignified choking sound. Gideon’s voice is not coming from the room. She feels the words as much as hears them. “H-how?” she finally manages, tongue flicking out to wet her paper-dry lips.

_I think that ‘one flesh, one end’ thing turned out to be a bit too literal._

Harrow leans forward, holding her breath, reaching out as though she might grasp onto something real.

_Hey now. Don’t get all sentimental on me here._

“I’m processing,” Harrow mutters, shaking her head. “They told me you were gone for good.”

_Let’s get down to business, _Gideon continues, as though she has not heard. Which, perhaps, she hasn’t._ Your upper body strength is pathetic, Harrow. Starting today, push ups. Every morning. Don’t think I won’t know if you cheat. I’m always watching. Which is creepy, by the way. We should probably discuss bathroom plans. And masturbation. I don’t know if I can close my eyes here yet._

Harrow presses her lips together. “Don’t you dare.”

_Cardio is an issue. Do laps, at least—“_

“I am not running _laps, _Griddle!”

_Crunches will be a challenge at first, but push those little abs of yours and—_

“Griddle!” Harrow slaps the wall beside her in frustration. “I’m not discussing workout routines right now!”

Her voice echoes in the silent chamber, broken only by a faint drip of water somewhere on the room, splashing onto stone. Harrow is accustomed to quiet, it was a natural consequence of being one of only two children on the Ninth and a Reverend Daughter at that, but she has never before noticed the difference between quiet and _silence. _The latter chokes, chills, fills her ears. Perhaps silence is waiting for an answer which never comes.

_I’m not there, Harrow. _Gideon’s voice is softer than it ever was in life. _I mean, I am, but I’m not THERE there. I can’t protect you with my biceps, amazing though they are. Don’t roll your eyes, I’ve seen you look at them, don’t pretend you haven’t. You need to be able to protect yourself. Ourself. I think we’re a package deal now._

“Sorry,” Harrow sniffs. The wall at her back feels even colder than before. She shivers, drawing her cloak more tightly around her shoulders. She can feel the crumbling concrete grinding into every vertebrae, pushing against her shoulder blades. She pulls a knucklebone from her pocket out of habit and wills it to stretch into a skeletal hand. It scuttles spider-like over the floor and halts by the foot of the bed with one finger raised, waiting. She closes her palm and the bones crumble into dust.

“Where are you?” Harrow asks. She waves her wrist and the bone dust curves and drifts through the air and eddies in the corners of the room. “I mean, what is it like?”

_I don’t know. It’s… warm. I think. It’s hard to describe. There’s a light. I’ve never seen so much light. Golden-coloured. Imagine the brightest, warmest gold you’ve ever seen._

“Can you feel anything?” Harrow asks then. What she means to say is, do you feel pain? Does it hurt still, in your chest, in your lungs, from the moment you flung yourself onto the iron spikes?

Gideon is silent. Harrow reaches forward, the coppery taste of panic rising in her throat, smearing over her tongue. “Gideon?”

_I don’t feel much. There’s this sort of glow, you know? Like sunlight on your skin._ _You wouldn’t like it. Sunlight goes against your aesthetic, princess. _

Harrow fights back a sob of relief. She tucks her knees up under her chin and pulls her cloak over them, feeling at once small and tired and very, very young.

A heaviness creeps into Harrow’s arms, weighing them down, tightening her grip on herself. She leans into it, anchoring herself in the embrace which is both strange and comforting.

_You feel that?_

Her hand rubs over her upper arm, searching for fingers and finding only air. “Yes. How are you doing it?”

_Wish I knew. I just… wanted to._

Salt pricks Harrow’s eyes and she wipes away the wetness with her sleeve. Her face paint comes away in greyish-white smears. “Don’t leave me.”

_I won’t. _Harrows hears, or rather, feels a smile in Gideon’s voice._ I’m yours and you’re mine, remember?_

The thought drives the air from her lungs as she swallows down the lump in her throat, cheeks growing damp despite her furious attempts to dry them. “I’ll find a way to bring you back,” she insists, one hand clenched into a fist against the rough stone floor. “I swear it. I will.”

_I know. I have faith in you._

“How? How do you know?” Her voice comes out in a harsh croak and she waits for the tease, for an echo of their old back and forth. Instead, a weight settles into her hand, the ghost of a touch. It might be her imagination playing tricks on her, but her palm tingles with the faintest warmth.

_I just do. Maybe that’s what love is._

“That thing you’re doing,” Harrow whispers. “Holding my hand? Could you keep doing that?”

_All you had to do was ask._

Something brushes against her lips, too quick to quantify, and the weight in her hand does not let go.


End file.
